Overview
- Her family said she died November 2 at the Alive hospice in Nashville after a long battle with cancer and requested privacy, quoting Robert Hunter’s blessing.
- She sang with the Grateful Dead from 1971 to 1979, appearing on albums from Europe ’72 to Shakedown Street and taking lead on Sunrise from Terrapin Station.
- Born Donna Jean Thatcher in Florence, Alabama, she came up as a Muscle Shoals session singer before moving to California in 1970.
- Her credits include vocals on Elvis Presley’s Suspicious Minds and Percy Sledge’s When a Man Loves a Woman, with later appearances on releases by Cher, Boz Scaggs and Bob Weir.
- She performed alongside her then‑husband, keyboardist Keith Godchaux, and after his 1980 death led projects including the Heart of Gold Band, Donna Jean Band and Donna Jean and the Tricksters.